Features » November 27, 2012

Somewhere Under the Rainbow

There should be no honeymoon for Obama or holiday for Congress. Now is the time for hitting the ground running, both as a militant minority and a wider progressive majority.

A rainbow coalition of Democratic voters gave Barack Obama a victory over big Wall Street money and the steady drumbeat of hard-right racism. Nearly 45 percent of the president’s voters were people of color, with their numbers augmented by white women, youth and trade unionists. It was enough to keep him in the White House, but not enough to decisively change the overall balance of forces.

Now the harder struggles begin—for Obama, for the Democratic Party and for the Left. Tough choices face all three.

Obama has to decide how he wants to govern in his second term. Does he want to be remembered as a center-right conciliator of neoliberal austerity and militarism who discounted key components of his rainbow? Or does he want to forge a deeper center-left majority coalition that can make wise use of government to create jobs, spur growth, promote equity and find solutions to global problems short of war? Since he has always been a liberal speaking mainly to the center, he can go either way.

The Democrats have a longer-term choice. Do they want to be the Blue Dog party of neoliberalism elite, best summed up by a Rahm Emanuel policy of “unite the center,” move to the Right and dismiss the Left? Or do they want to revisit their Keynesian roots with a Green New Deal that builds an educational and manufacturing infrastructure for the 21st century? The first course means the country continues its steady reactionary drift, rewarding a privileged few. The second means a progressive turn that can reward the rest of us.

The Left faces a choice, too. Do we continue trying to build mass movements, in the hope that they will be the engines of a new and transformative strategic politics? Or do we go further than our usual “movement building” mantra and put new emphasis on organization building? We’ve seen the Wisconsin and Ohio uprisings, Occupy Wall Street, and the pressing of the Robin Hood tax by the Congressional Progressive Caucus—all of which are the beginnings of an emerging popular front against finance capital, one pregnant with new potential. But without organization, movements simply ebb and flow—and often dissipate. Our task now is to combine fanning the flames with a new organizing thrust.

We have to evolve political groups with electoral capacities than can win elections locally. We must expand the ranks of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, turning it into our left- progressive pole inside the Beltway.

We have to encourage more social justice trade unions, like the Chicago Teachers Union. We have to grow our grassroots coalitions, like the Virginia New Majority, and to launch solidarity economy projects, like Cleveland’s Evergreen Cooperatives. We have to promote a new culture of educating with reason, promoting science over ideology, and defending the core democratic values of the Enlightenment. We must speak truth to power while we fashion the instruments to take power. In brief, we require a united, determined core of Left political organizers with a wider and deeper vision for economic democracy and a socialism worthy of the 21st century.

There should be no honeymoon for Obama or holiday for Congress. Now is the time for hitting the ground running, both as a militant minority and a wider progressive majority. The forces of “bipartisan compromise” and “grand bargains” are already working on plans, like Simpson-Bowles to bail out capitalism’s systemic crisis on our dime.

Politicians pay attention to organized money, organized voters and (at least occasionally) organized thinking. The Left is lacking in the first, but we can put the latter two into play. We rarely gain anything at the top that we haven’t already gathered the strength for at the base—and that ball is in our court, not Obama’s or the Democratic Party’s.

Carl Davidson is a national co-chair for Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and
Socialism. He lives near Pittsburgh and is a member of Steelworker Associates, a community-action arm of the United Steelworkers.

Operation PUSH was successful at raising public awareness to initiate corporate action and government sponsorship. The National Rainbow coalition became a prominent political organization that raised public awareness on numerous political issues and consolidated a large voting bloc. The merged entity has undertaken numerous social initiatives. -954-691-1102

Posted by Stephanie Kaye Lopez on 2012-12-11 13:27:52

Davidson piles a lot on the to-do list -- and leads with electoral work in the hopelessly stacked arena that is the two-party system -- but as usual, provides zero ideas about how to build resources and human capacity for any of these endeavors. Why? Because in his book the holy grail remains, first and foremost, elections. This classic 'cart before horse' frame ignores the fact that the most effective movements recognize that electoral expression is one tactic in a much broader toolkit that includes direct action, people to people solidarity, and grassroots work that breaks free of the issue silos into which ruling elites seek to ghettoize progressive work.

We live in an era of growing class consciousness and it's potent capacity to break through the single-issue silos that often hinder united front work -- as opposed to the pop front work Davidson advocates, where we all subsume our core concerns to a single slogan like, oh, say, 'vote for Obama!' That approach -- and our utter failure to push core principles like rank-and-file empowerment and grassroots democracy -- has gotten us a Democratic Party that continues to tilt right ... unless we force them to tilt left by any means necessary.

Posted by Christine Geovanis on 2012-12-10 15:30:52

The first order of business for President Obama should be to repay his political debt to Black America. Every other interest group except for the African -American community has realized political payback for supporting this president. Unions, Wall Street, Caucasians, White Women in particular, Gays & Lesbians, and Hispanics, have seen their support rewarded. Isn't time for this president to honor his political debt to the African American. community for their support ? Believe or not, there are quite a few people like well known journalist, Sam Donaldson, who think so !

Posted by dtondelayo on 2012-12-04 10:28:52

If the "Left" was truly interested in changing things, it should devote far, far more time and effort to opening up our political system. Roughly 25 states have citizen initiative processes. What would happen if the "Left", in concert with other disaffected parties, e.g., Libertarians, environmental groups, etc. put initiatives on the ballot in these states to implement some form of instant-runoff voting?

Imagine an electoral process where citizens can actually vote their interests without wasting their votes and voting in the "greater of two evils"? The idea that the Democratic Party will reform itself strains credulity. Without real competition at polling places, nothing will change.

Posted by themikeaustin on 2012-12-03 15:33:31

What left? As for what direction the president will take, remember, the neo-liberal Clinton is regarded as something of a hero among middle class liberals, so what would President Obama have to lose to doing the same (besides integrity, etc.)? As for the Dem Party leadership, one would be hard-pressed to find one who isn't a Blue Dog/Clintonite. Where the country is at/where it's going: "Occupy" began as a powerful movement that had the potential to change the direction this country has taken, restoring the opportunity we had before corporations gained such power over politics. A year ago, there was tremendous hope. Media effectively intervened, redefining Occupy as a movement solely of (disgruntled) middle class workers. Since then, the public discussion has been all about, and only about, the middle class - a sort of Bourgeoisie Bash. The rest of us walked away, and Occupy fizzled out.

Posted by DHFabian on 2012-12-01 00:42:31

Yes, charity work and voting for Democrats will save the left, says the former Pol Pot supporter turned chairman of Progressives for Obama.